Curiosity killed the cat? Perhaps, but lack of curiosity or insufficient curiosity kills Science.
Curiosity in one’s work is incessantly asking questions about “How?” and “Why?”.
Of course children are doing this all the time, but usually they address these questions to adults, and when they try to answer these questions by themselves, they can be in danger because they do not yet have adequate knowledge and experience to fully appreciate the answers. Scientists usually have both knowledge and experience, but their curiosity may have diminished, sometimes completely. Without curiosity Science dies.
Scientists who are not curious about the Unknown and the Unexplained infect Science with a dangerous disease. In principle this fact is well known. For instance, in the opening section of a 2007 report of the European Research Council entitled “What Makes Scientists Creative?” we could read these words:
Humans are curious by nature and have been seeking knowledge about the universe, our natural environment, our past and future since ancient times. Scientists exhibit a heightened level of curiosity. They go further and deeper into basic questions showing a passion for knowledge for its own sake.
Curiosity is the driving force of basic, or pure, science. The desire to go beyond the established frontiers of knowledge, to explore the boundaries of discipline and to resolve unanswered questions, is motivated essentially by human inquisitiveness. (Italics, mine.)
But it is one thing is to know certain truth “in principle”, and quite another is to notice the cases in which the principle should be applied, but is not.
Curiosity is Not Enough: Freedom is Essential
Lack of curiosity, intellectual indifference and laziness – they all kill Science. But even when curiosity is present, Science will not grow as it could – and should - without total intellectual freedom.
Bertrand Russell, was well aware of the dangers for Science coming not only through the political use of Science, but also from within Science itself. He warned us:
Those to whom intellectual freedom is personally important may be a minority in the community, but among them are the men of most importance to the future. We have seen the importance of Copernicus, Galileo, and Darwin in the history of mankind, and it is not to be supposed that the future will produce no more such men. If they are prevented from doing their work and having their due effect, the human race will stagnate, and a new Dark Age will succeed, as the earlier Dark Age succeeded the brilliant period of antiquity. New truth is often uncomfortable, especially to the holders of power; nevertheless, amid the long record of cruelty and bigotry, it is the most important achievement of our intelligent but wayward species. (Italics, mine.)
New truth is, indeed, often uncomfortable and the history of Science tells how scientists who were asking questions “why?” and “how” have been treated. Learning about how such processes took place in the past enables us to be more sensitive to very same things happening now, all around us. The battle of the Titans still takes place between Science and religion, but it also can be seen within Science itself.
P.S.1. Out of curiosity I have recently watched the 1987 movie "Fatal attraction".
Coming next: The Curiosity of Alfred Russel Wallace
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